The Securities and Exchange Board of India has cleared former New York Stock Exchange managing director, Madhu Kannan’s name for the post of CEO for Asia’s oldest bourse, the BSE, reports Business Standard. An official announcement regarding this is expected soon.

Madhu Kannan was also the managing director (corporate strategy), Bank of America-Merrill Lynch.

In January, Egon Zehnder was appointed to shortlist candidates for the top post at BSE. Four names were identified: Kannan, National Stock Exchange Chief Technology Officer Ravi Apte, Reliance Industries Chief Information Officer Ashish Chauhan and the current chief operating officer and acting chief executive officer of BSE, M L Soneji.

The post of CEO has been lying vacant ever since its managing director, Rajnikant Patel, resigned abruptly in August last year. Mr Patel quit over alleged inter-board differences over management issues. Since then, BSE COO Mahesh Soneji has been ‘looking after the day-to-day affairs’ of the exchange.